Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-01-31

their chief delight among those who gam
bled and
swoRE AND RACED HORSES,
now they find their chief Joy among those
who go to prayer meetings and churches,
50 complete is the delusion. Yea, their
own families have noticed 1.-THE wife
has noticed it, the children have noticed
| it. The money that went for rum now
goes for books and for clothes and for
education He is new man. All who
know him say there has been wonderful
| change. What is the cause of this
/ change? This great hallucination of the
Christian religion. There is as much
difference between what he is now and
what he once WIS, as between rose and
nettle. as between dove and vulture,
as between day and night. Tremendous
delusion.
Admiral Farragut, one of the most ad-
mlred men of the American navy, early
became a victim of this Christian
delusion, and, seated, not long
before his death, at Long Branch,
he was giving some friends an
account of his ea-ly life, He said: "My
father went down in behalf of the United
States government to put an eud to
Aaron Burr's rebellion. | was a cabin
boy and went along with him. ! could
swear like en- old salt. l could gamble
in every style of gambling. l knew all
the wicheduess there was at that time
abroad. One day my father cleared
everybody out of the cabin except my
self, and locked the door. He said:
David, what are you going to do?
What are you going to be,' WELL l
said, father, | am going to follow the
sea- Follow the sea. and be poor,
miserable, drunken sailor, kicked and
Cuffed about the world and die of fever
in a foreign hospital?' ooh! no. said,
father will not be that; l will tread the
quarterback and command, as you do
NO, David my father said; mo, David,
person that has your principles and
your bad habits will never tread the quar-
ter deck or command My father went
out and shut the door after him, and l
said then Il will change, l will never
swear again, | will never drink again, l
Will never gamble again. and, gentlemen,
by the help of God | have kept those three
vows to this time. | soon after that be-
came CHRISTIAN, and that decided my
fate for time and for eternity"
Another captive of this great Christian
deIusion. There goes Saul of Tsrsus on
horseback at full galop. Where is he
going? To destroy Christians. He wants
no better play-spell than to stand and
WATCH THE HATS
and coats of the murderers who are mas
sacreing Gods children. There goes the
same man. This time he is efoot.
Where is he going now? Going on the
road to OSuis to die for Christ. They
tried to whip it out of him, they tried to
scare it out of HIM, they thought they
would give him enough of it by putting
him into a windowless dungeon and
keeping him on small diet, and
denying him a cloak, and con
demning him as criminal, and
bowling at him through the street; but
they could not freeze it out of him, and
they could not sweat it out of him, and
they could not pound it out of him, so
they tried the surgery of the sword, and
one summer day In Ct he was decapitated.
Perhaps the mlghtiest intellect of the
5000 years of the worlds existence hood
winked, cheated, cajoled, duped by the
Cnristisn religion. Ali that is the re-
markable thing about this delusion of
Christianity; it Overpowers the strongest
intellects. Gather the critics, secular
and religious, of this century together,
and put vote to them as to which is the
greatest book ever written, and by large
majority they will say paradise Lost. ,
Who wrote paradise Lost?" One of the
fools who believed in this Bible, John
Milton. Benjamin Franklin surrendered
to this delusion, if you may Judge from
the letter that he wrote to Thomas Paine
begging him to destroy the age of Rea-
son" in manuscript and never let it go
into type, and writing afterward, in his
old days: "Of this Jesus of Nazareth l
have to say that the system of morals He
left and the religion He has given US are
the best things the world has ever seen
or is likely to see." Patrick Henry, the
electric
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY,
enslsved, by this deluslon, so
that he says: "The book worth
all other books put together is
the Bible" Benjamin Rush, the lead
ing Psychologist and anstomlst of his day,
the great medical scientist-what did he
say? 1.-THE only true and perfect religion
is Christianity" Isaac Newton, the
leading philosopher of his time-what
did he say? That man surrendering to
this delusion of the Christian religion,
crying out: "The sublimest philosophy
on earth is the philosophy of the Cos
pei" David Brewster, at the pronuncis-
ton of whose name every scientist the
world over bows his head, David Brew
ster saying: 80, this religion has been a
great light to me, very great light all
my days" President Tiers, the great
French statesman, acknowledging that he
prayed when he said: az invoke the Lord
God in whom am glad to believe" Da-
vid Livingstone, able to conquer the lion,
able to conquer the panther, able to con-
quer the savage, yet conquered by this
deluslon, this hallncinstion, this great
sV indie Of the ages, so when they find
him dead they find him on his knees.
William E. Gladstone, the strongest in
tellect in England to-day, unable to resist
this chimera, this fallacy, this delusion Of
the Christian religion, goes to the house
of God every Sabbath, and often, at the
invitation of the rector, reads the pray
ers to the people. o, if those mighty in
tellects are overcome by this delusioD,
what chance is there for you and me?
Besides that, have noticed that first
rate intldels cannot be depended on for
steadfastness in the proclamation of their
sentiments. Goethe, leading skeptic,
was so wrought upon by this Christianity
that in weak moment he cried out:
"My belief in the Bible has saved me in
TOW ot0l T.